MSE news: The £95 parking ticket for taking too long to spend

momimum

My husband parked in an Aldi (Seven Kings, London) car park last December and "overstayed" and received a parking fine for going over the 90 mins. He phoned the company to complain about ticket, they said send proof of purchase from Aldi, sent copy of reciept and never heard from them again. (can't find paperwork but from memory company based in South London). Hope that helps.

trisontana

momimum wrote: »

My husband parked in an Aldi (Seven Kings, London) car park last December and "overstayed" and received a parking fine for going over the 90 mins. He phoned the company to complain about ticket, they said send proof of purchase from Aldi, sent copy of reciept and never heard from them again. (can't find paperwork but from memory company based in South London). Hope that helps.

For a start it wasn't a "fine" and secondly if he had ignored them they would have stopped bothering him anyway.

If these shops want to stop unauthorised parking on their site all they have to do is install barriers which are opened with some sort of proof of purchase from the shop. This can either be a token, or somebody looking at a receipt from the shop.

downhiller

it's quite simple.

If you receive any parking "invoice" from a private parking company, ignore it. Ignore everything they send you. If, in a 1 in a million chance, they issue a county court summons, turn up and defend yourself having done the proper research on how to do so.

I'm currently sitting with 100+ tickets from a private parking company, all for parking in the same spot, and they have zero intention of taking me to court as they know they won't/ can't win.

They're trying to charge me £180 per ticket so without factoring in the charges from the various debt collection agencies they passed the case to, or the phoney lawyers, they believe I owe them a minimum of £18,000.

Yet there's no chance of them ever taking me to court!

stingyscot

I had a similar experience with Tesco at Bar Hill, Cambridge. I had an optician's appointment, shopped, and had some lunch, and exceeded their time allowance. I felt it was a real invasion of privacy that they noted my number and then presumably contacted the DVLA to get my home address. I though only the Police could get those details. What price 'data protection'? However, when I phoned Tesco the Customer Service lady was very nice, cancelled the fine, and said that if I was ever again doing something that would take a long time (e.g. sight test and choosing frames) that I should let them know at Customer Services in the shop when I arrived and then I wouldn't be ticketed.

m1974m

momimum wrote: »

My husband parked in an Aldi (Seven Kings, London) car park last December and "overstayed" and received a parking fine for going over the 90 mins. He phoned the company to complain about ticket, they said send proof of purchase from Aldi, sent copy of reciept and never heard from them again. (can't find paperwork but from memory company based in South London). Hope that helps.

My girlfriend also received one after "overstaying" (overshopping?) in Aldi (Seven Kings). It was a "parking charge notice" but, despite some correspondance with Aldi, she could not persuade the Aldi Area Manager to cancel the ticket because she had not kept her receipt.

loadsalaughs

roddydogs wrote: »

He used the parking to go shopping elsewhere thats obvious, why shuld any business provide free parking if you not shopping in that store.....would you if you owned a business?

I live just up the road from that homebase (southgate) and the fact is that there are no other shops near there, there is a Tile Shop and another Building supplies place further up the road, but there are no other shops apart from that.
The reason for the "enforcers" is that there is a main line train station 100 meters up the road and a tube station 250 meters away and people used to park there all day and get the train into work.

but I do agree with Roddydogs that it isnt fair if people take advantage of free parking in this way, it must be a real pain for the store if customers cant park because of idiots abusing the car park.

patman99

My local SAinburys (Tollgate, Stanway) had a big problem with people using it as a 'park and ride' due to it being conveinient for the 65 bus route, they now have a 3 hour limit. However, the rest of Tollgate retail park has no parking restrictions, so you can park-up and walk a short distance to catch the bus anyway.

p_moss

I received a parking charge notice for parking too long in their car park.I went shopping in their store with my wife and triplet boys (who are 16 months old). After we had finished shopping we returned to the car and the babies were screaming/crying. We changed them and fed them in the car. After everyone was settled we drove home. After about 10 days we received a 'Parking charge notice' from a private company called Parking eye informing us that as we had overstayed the free parking time we incurred a penalty charge of £70. (reduced to £40 if paid in 14 days)

I phoned the parking company to challenge the ticket to be told that there was no point in appealing as the charge would only increase to the full amount £70 and that I would not win anyway as I was parked on private land and who could I appeal to anyway.

It seemed that I had no choice in the matter and I paid the money. I then wrote a letter to Aldi to complain- and to this date have not received a reply.

I have not shopped at this store since.

hollydays

The barstewards

Lopo

Received one of these from the same G24 company with pics after a few days of having visted another Homebase store which happens to be near a large train station and is understandably often abused for parking purposes as a result. THEY must be coining it there!!

However, I simply went back into the store with a bundle of receipts having made many purchases over a few weeks of decorating and simply asked them to sort it as I had been spending around £400 also over the period.

Having remained polite while asking/discussing it the girl (not a manager) at the customer service desk made a call and had it cancelled. She did say a letter would arrive indicating the cancellation, but nothing did ever turn up....have not heard from them further in 10+ months.

Google for "G24 parking".....it has many people ranting and fighting about it. The letter with pic is made to look like a speed trap/traffic offence. Its just shameful really...

I was incensed having received it, but pleasantly surprised how easy it was to have removed, however....I was anxious about it for many months thereafter...

So annoying......society needs to change its behaviour to one another. Boycott the retail parks that deploy such schemes... people must fight back.